


Separation Anxiety

by FilmFreak94



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-06
Updated: 2017-01-06
Packaged: 2018-09-15 05:38:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9221411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FilmFreak94/pseuds/FilmFreak94
Summary: How can two parts of a whole endure to be separate for so long?





	

**Author's Note:**

> I think this is the first time I've written an SU story from Steven's perspective. Kind of a tough challenge getting his mannerisms and train of thought how it would be on the actual show, but no more so for anybody else. Takes place some time after Mindful Education.

It had been far too long since either of them had seen each other.

Well, being completely honest with himself, he knew this was only half true. They had seen each other plenty of times in the past few weeks, through text messages or video chats, but it wasn’t the same as the both of them physically present in the same room. At least, not to him.

Neither were to blame for the lack of physical presence; She had the start of school on her shoulders, he had the crippling weight of his mother’s legacy, a team of misfits and renegades to look after, and the impending threat of an invading army from another galaxy on his. Safe to say, they had both become pretty swamped of late, to the point where even their texts grew shorter.

He didn’t want to pester her while she was busy with her schoolwork, especially when her parents were so strict about her keeping up her grades (though, in fairness to them, they had both become slightly more lenient after learning of her sword training with him), yet he couldn’t help but feel a little selfish. She was his best friend after all, it was only natural he’d want to spend more time with her. His father had told him that much one lazy day when he confessed his guilt to him.

“Don’t worry about it, bud,” he said, hosing down a minivan as they talked. “That’s how I always felt whenever your mom was away on long missions.”

“Did she feel the same as you?”

“Well,” he picked at the shining bald spot on his scalp, in desperate need of another coat of sunscreen, “her perception of time was a little different from ours.”

“How different?”

“Well, let’s just say there was one time when she thought she was only gone for about three days.”

“How long was it really?”

“Three months.”

Steven gulped at the memory. The separation between him and Connie had never been as bad as three months, even during all that time preparing for The Cluster at the barn. But then he couldn’t help but wonder if his perception of time was a little different from an ordinary human’s as well.

What could have felt like an eternity to him was no time at all for Connie, making his desire to hang out with her even more selfish. As far as he could tell there had never been a time in his life where it felt like multiple days were just one. If anything he felt the opposite, especially when there were no missions or any other friends and acquaintances around. This could only affirm his theory that time passed differently for him, however, and it twisted the knot underneath his quartz gemstone further.

The knot was there for several reasons; The first being that he was getting what he wanted, face to face and in person time with his favorite human (no offense to his dad or anyone else), the several were all the intruding, anxious worries heaped upon him the closer he got to the Wilmingmore Community Center for the Arts®. They were no more severe than the dozens of other intruding, anxious thoughts that entered his head on a daily basis, the major difference being he didn’t have to face the other ones at this very moment.

He swallowed his fear and adjusted his bowtie, nearly slipping off his ride as he did. Lion growled in annoyance as he instinctively clung to a tuft of mane.

“Sorry buddy!” Steven buried his face in Lion’s mane, careful not to end up in the other dimension, and gave his noble steed a peck on the head. The pink, mighty beast seemed sated by this and ran on, closing the distance between them and the Wilmingmore Community Center for the Arts®.

Steven calmed his breaths, timing them between Lion’s paws striding against the road, dodging oncoming cars by weaving between or jumping over them. The bobbing and weaving was never much of a concern, Lion’s back always providing a fairly smooth ride, it was the bobbing and weaving his heart was up to that bothered him.

He pushed it aside when Lion came to a full stop right outside the front door of the building, skidding so hard a bit of dirt launched onto the unabashed Valet’s vest. His face remained stolid as he brushed himself off and the little boy jumped off his lion.

“Thanks bud, here you go.” Steven gave Lion a handful of biscuits he’d been saving in his pocket, the giant fluff of fur scooping them up with his tongue. He put a leash on Lion’s diamond encrusted collar (a fake bought at the Beach City pet store, but it was important that Lion feel fancy too) and handed the leash to the Valet.

“He likes when you scratch the side of his belly.” Rustling in his pocket again he found a small stack of fifty dollar bills in his pocket, loose change his dad gave him for the night, and put it in the Valet’s free hand, his face still emotionless. Steven took no notice and made his way inside, stopping at one of the windows to give himself one final once over. He looked good, wearing the same fancy penguin suit he, his dad and Pearl wore when they visited Empire City (sans the top hat that fell off somewhere between Beach City and Ocean Town). He licked his thumb and ran it along the side of his curly hair, clicking the heels of his shoes. Yeah, he was slick. He was a star, he was a supernova, he was a rocket heading straight into a supernova, he was a rocket full of Rubies that were still floating off in space somewhere…

A sudden twinge of conscience and perturbation distracted him from his reflection. He shook his head and followed an older couple through the revolving doors. Lion watched him as he left, his eyes lingering on the doors for some time after his friend had disappeared through them, paying no heed to the strange glances and worried whispers of the other patrons heading inside the building. The Valet paid them no mind either, his thoughts preoccupied with the giant, baby pink hairball sitting in front of him, holding up the valet line (not that any driver was going to tell a fully grown lion to get out of their way). Eventually the Valet shrugged and gave the leash a light tug, guiding Lion to the parking lot, making a mental note to give the peculiar beast a good belly scratch when he decided on a spot.

 

The inside of the Wilmingmore Community Center for the Arts® was truly a marvel to behold. The image of many ancient Gem structures, such as the Sea Spire or the Pyramid Temple, had always stuck out in his mind as if he were standing in them at this very moment, and yet he felt no hesitation in comparing their visual magnificence to this. It was his first time in a building like this, after all. A building meant to evoke a certain array of styles; French Rococo mostly, though with a subtle hint of Greek influence from the marble statues of almost-naked people adorning the bottom floor and up the staircases. He was sure Connie could tell him more about each of them, if only he could find her.

It was a large building, spacious from length to width, and there were plenty of taller adults dressed in more ostentatious and expensive penguin suits to obscure his line of sight. Thankfully, Connie was only a little taller than him so it wasn’t a total disadvantage to be caught underneath the legs of so many disinterested adults whose indistinct conversations reverberated across the walls to muffle any hope of Connie possibly hearing him.

“Steven?” That didn’t stop someone from trying to reach out to him. He turned around, perking both ears as best he could to isolate where the familiar call was coming from.

“Steven, over here!” Trying to see past a group of older women standing near one of the statues, Steven caught his first glance of Connie Maheswaran in the flesh for the first time in several weeks, and for just one moment, all the anxious thoughts that had been running away with him ceased. An undeniable smile crept upon his lips as he rushed as quick as he could through the crowd to her. Connie met him halfway, smiling and laughing herself as she lifted Steven off the ground and led him in tiny twirl that could have knocked an older gentlemen clean out if he were a second slower in getting out of their vicinity.

“Forgot how strong you were!” Connie put him down, her face turning a shade that was darker than Garnet’s.

“Sorry, sorry.” She said, still laughing. “Wow, it… really hasn’t been that long, has it?”

The knot in Steven’s gemstone lurched. The thoughts were back.

“Uh, no not… really, I guess…” He pulled his collar away from his neck, averting eye contact to the chandeliers hanging higher and higher above, his vision falling into a tunnel that made him feel like he was sinking into the floor.

“You look great!” Connie changed the subject.

“Oh, yeah, old suit. You look…” He hadn’t taken a thorough notice of how Connie looked during the first few moments of their unimportant reunion. She always looked great, that was never in question, but tonight she was wearing a light blue dress with white floral lace on the collar, and little white buttons trailing down the chest that seemed to fit no purpose other than flair. She wore long, white gloves and shoes of a darker blue to complete the dress, her black hair neatly combed and down to her waist as it always was, save for training.

“You look amazing.” Steven finished his compliment, massively underselling it in his own mind. Connie seemed to appreciate it anyway, talking about how her mom had picked it out for her two years ago when they had visited the Royal Opera House in the Great Isles.

“It was a little big for me back then. Still feels kind of loose in some places.”

“This suit kinda feels a little tight for me.” Steven said, the both of them sharing another laugh at their costume woes (not the first or the last of the woes they’d shared a pity laugh over).

“Come on, we should get to our seats.” She reached into a tiny handbag and produced two tickets, leading the way to one of the takers, who seemed rather nonplussed at the two children dolled up for an opera as she scanned them both and pointed the way up the staircase to the upper section where they’d be seated.

“Have you ever been to an opera before, Steven?” Connie asked.

“Nope,” he answered with a certain gaiety that most ordinary children would upon being asked if they had ever been to an opera, “but I think Pearl bought some old tapes with some opera songs when I was a baby.”

“What were they?” He shrugged.

“Amethyst sold them to get the complete Lil Butler VHS set.”

“Oh.” Connie hadn’t meant to sound so distasteful in her response, she had seen reruns of that show on occasion and she just couldn’t get behind the premise. She also couldn’t get behind the “Crying Breakfast Friends” show either, not understanding how any show that centered around damaged characters weeping uncontrollably and never truly resolving their problems could have such a huge fan base, but kept those opinions to herself. Steven liked it, so she was obviously just missing something.

“How many operas have you been to?” Steven asked.

“Not too too many; Tosca, Carmen, Aida, all the really famous stuff. I was too young to understand what was going on in most of them.”

“My dad took me to a rock opera once.”

“Oh, sounds cool.” The truth of that matter was Steven had fallen asleep during the first thirty minutes. Not for dislike of the show, something about a group of alley cats fighting over a technicolor raincoat on a balcony in South America, but because it had been his seventh birthday and most of it preceding the rock opera had been spent running around Funland like a seven-year-old boy allowed to run loose in an amusement park to his heart’s content. No matter what the quality of the show was, anyone that age would be out like a shot the moment the lights of the house dimmed.

“The music was pretty neat.” He said instead, not wanting to seem too uneducated in the ways of theatre. The further upstairs they went the more it was clear how greatly uneducated he was. Not just in theatre but in general Arts® itself.

“I did want to check out the art gallery before the show started,” Connie said with a longing look at the large oil paintings as they passed, “but they already gave the five-minute warning.”

“Sorry I got here so late.” Steven said, hanging his head a bit.

“Oh, no, it’s no big deal at all. I’m surprised I got here in time at all with how slow the bus was going.”

“You took a bus to get here?” Connie paused on one of the steps ahead to wait for him to catch up.

“Dad’s working at a concert in Charm City and Mom got caught up at the hospital, so I just decided it’d save us both time if I took a bus a few hours early. I didn’t know it’d take so long to get here, though.”

“You could’ve called me,” Steven said, trying to mask the irrational hurt he felt, “I would’ve swung by your house on Lion.”

“No, really, it was fine. I’ve never ridden the bus before today, it was…” she thought of the old sailor who kept trying to sell her fish hooks with live worms still attached to them, and the one-eyed old lady who carried her pregnant cat in a cardboard box (“Gonna blow any minute now!”), “…an experience,” she finished.

“Kinda surprised your parents let you take the bus.” Steven said, careful not to bring up any old wounds or start something he didn’t intend to.

“I know!” Connie bit her lip and gave him a tiny shove in excitement. “I texted Mom just to let her know what I was doing and you know what she texted back?” Steven shook his head, eager to hear what Dr. Maheswaran had texted. Connie leaned in close, so close not even the nosy blonde woman and her balding husband trailing immediately behind could hear them.

“O…K….” Steven furrowed his brow.

“Okay?”

“Okay! She said ‘Okay!’”

“Cool!”

“I mean; Last year they wouldn’t even _dream_ of letting me go anywhere alone with a boy.” Steven felt a new knot tie around his gut. A slightly more pleasant one than its predecessor, but painful nevertheless. “They’ve warmed up to you a lot. You and the other Gems.”

“That’s great!” Steven was grateful she brought it back to the Gems in general rather than only him, though the knot in his gut didn’t feel any looser.

They were quiet as they finished the trudge up the staircase, both growing too winded to talk once they neared the top. Funny, they both non-verbally decided with a knowing laugh, how they could go for hours on end with their training and feel fine yet a simple walk up a flight of steps could tucker them both. That would be Homeworld’s secret weapon, Steven decided, a long staircase. It would be the end of all of them for sure.

Their seats were located at the bottom of the upper levels, a pretty good view of the stage only blurred slightly by the metal bars meant to keep you from falling onto the unsuspecting audience below. Connie had taken a program from one of the ushers and was pouring through it while Steven glanced at the title; _Guillaume Tell_ , translated to “William” in English. It was a fancy title for a fancy show in a fancy building like this. A building where he felt at any moment he could be thrown out for being so blatantly misplaced in it.

“Do you think any of Rossini’s work might have been on the tapes you listened to Steven?”

“Huh?” He said, snapping out of his thoughts.

“I was just asking if maybe you’ve heard of Rossini before.”

 

“Oh yes, of course I have!” Pearl shot up fully erect the moment Steven spoke the composer’s name. “Monsieur Crescendo, I haven’t thought of him in a long time.”

“So, you know some of his stuff?”

“Well, I should, I met him personally.” Steven blinked rapidly as Pearl returned to organizing the swords in her room. They had just finished a sparring session that felt too empty without Connie’s presence and Steven had gotten the text from Connie asking him if he’d like to go to the opera with her earlier that morning.

“You _met_ him?” Pearl gave a soft chuckle. It was amusing how easily Steven forgot her age sometimes.

“We had some business in the countryside of that region. Rose couldn’t help but be drawn to the settlement nearby and met many artists and musicians, Rossini being one of them.” It was surprising, in hindsight, how many people the Gems met ended up being remembered as famous or infamous years after the fact, and how many others who found themselves closer to Rose in some way or another faded into obscurity. Even Greg had given up his goal of singing professionally for her, not that he seemed to mind.

“Did you ever see one of his shows?” Pearl turned to him with her index finger raised.

“ _Operas_ , Steven. And yes, your mother and I did attend one of them. Which one are you going to go see?”

“Uh,” Steven squinted at his phone, trying to sound out the strange title. “Gu-Guy-Guy-i-llama-loume-loom-”

“ _Guillaume Tell_?” Pearl said with perfect pronunciation.

“Yeah, how’d you know?”

“That’s the one we saw.” Pearl said, a glimmer of fond nostalgia on her tongue. It had been a rather emotional experience, especially since the subject matter was so familiar to her (at least on an exterior level).

“Do you think you could give me a rundown on it?”

“Don’t you want to experience it for yourself?” Pearl asked, her own almost spiritual experience she had with it resurfacing in her mind.

“Well, sure, but I’m just worried that…” Steven’s voice trailed off as his eyes fell to the surface of the water spout they were standing on.

“Worried about what, sweetie?” Pearl approached Steven and knelt to his level, placing a concerned hand on his shoulder, growing worried herself as to what could be bothering him.

“I’mworriedthatI’mgonnafallasleepifIdon’tknowtheplot.” He said.

“Wh-what?” Steven repeated himself, slower this time, and Pearl nodded in understanding.

“It’s a bit long.” Steven said that was fine, and so Pearl began. Going on about a rebellion, a romance, something about hunting, an emperor, singing a few of the arias and getting carried away with the show’s big climax, and by the time she had finished Steven felt that his brain might short circuit from the four acts he had just been retold by a Gem who spared no details, no matter how minor.

“That’s the whole play?” He asked simply.

“ _Opera_ , and yes, that’s the long and short of it.” She smiled at him with childlike eagerness, waiting to hear what he thought of it. He thought he liked it, at least, he thought he did… did he… what was that thing that happened in Act One, or… Act Four…

“Do you know any cool facts about Rossini at least?”

Pearl’s eager expression fell to a blank grimace. She shook it off with a shrug, he was only fourteen after all.

“Well, I do remember one thing…”

 

“Did you know he had a cat that almost suffocated him in his sleep once?” Connie stared at him.

“N-no.” Steven could feel a pin drop at the bottom floor of the auditorium, or perhaps that was just his stomach. He knew he should’ve mentioned how Rose Quartz herself had given him a few words as to the nature of a brutal rebellion but he couldn’t get his mind straight. He must have jumped to it so carelessly because he had some personal experience with cats and suffocation, and that painful memory was all but too familiar at this moment.

It would be too late to bounce back after that cat anecdote anyway, since the orchestra began their overture and the house lights grew dull. Connie leaned forward in her chair while Steven slumped backwards in his. He hardly noticed when the show had begun in earnest, snapping out of his embarrassment when Connie leaned over to whisper her compliments to the lead singer. He gave the show his full attention after that, saving his mistakes for another time. He couldn’t understand a word of what any character was saying, the show presented in its original language, but the music was nice and he at least recognized some of the plot beats from Pearl’s synopsis.

And if all else fell short, the girl on his left never would. Glancing at her from the corner of his eye, seeing her enraptured by the performance below them, sitting next to her for the first time in what might as well have been years. The flub he’d made a second ago didn’t matter, nor did the knot in his stomach. She was happy, and that was all he needed to lift his spirits.

 

“I’m never gonna get that finale out of my head.” Connie said as they exited the building out the revolving doors.

“I liked all the bits between the acts.” Steven said.

“Yeah, the instrumentals of any Rossini show will always be fantastic. Kind of peeved they didn’t say it was the abridged version on any of the advertising.”

“That was the _abridged_ version,” Steven stopped himself from saying, his butt still sore from the past four hours with only one intermission. Connie checked the time on her phone, half past nine.

“What time did your parents want you back home,” Steven asked her.

“Midnight at the latest.”

“But don’t you have school tomorrow?”

“It’s Friday, Steven.”

“Oh, yeah.” He had never fully grasped the concept of school or the days off from it. Sometimes Connie or Peedee or any other kid his age would have a day off or several days off apart from the typical weekend and other times they wouldn’t. He couldn’t keep track of it so he decided not to, rolling with the punches, as it were.

“So, what do you want to do now?” Connie asked him.

“Mmmm,” he shrugged, “what do you wanna do?”

“I’m not that familiar with Wilmingmore,” she admitted, “wish I’d brought a map.”

“Well,” Steven offered, “when we were heading to Keystone that one time I saw there was an arcade near the highway.”

 “What about the Funland Arcade?” Connie asked.

“It doesn’t stay open this late. Besides, Mr. Smiley doesn’t really let me play any of the games after I had to destroy his Beat Meat Mania.”

“Wait, what?”

“Oh, shoot, did I never tell you that?” She shook her head, and he was about to launch into a Pearl-style recap when the Valet came back with Lion in toe, covered himself from head to toe in pink fur.

“Your lion, sir.”  Lion kept nudging at the man’s back, his cold nose sending rare flashes of reaction to his stone face.

“Thanks!” Steven gave him another stack of fifties and another handful of biscuits for Lion. “Come on,” he as he climbed on top of Lion, “I’ll tell you on the way.” He offered her his hand which she took without hesitation, clinging onto his waist as he reared Lion back and the great cat ran off down the road and into the night. The Valet watched as they left, removing a lint roller from his pocket. With a heavy sigh he resolved himself to his life, thankful with the knowledge that at least he wouldn’t have to deal with a lion again.

 

“So what’s your plan?” The purple Gem asked as they walked down the boardwalk.

“We were just gonna go to the opera and-”

“No, dude,” Amethyst took an enormous bite out of her hot dog, chewing as she talked, “the operahsh lame. You gohtta go shomewhere elshe sho the nightsh not a tohtal busht.”

“But I’ve never been to Wilmingmore. I didn’t even know there was a Wilmingmore Community Center for the Arts®, till this morning.”

“Wha,” she swallowed, “what?”

“The Wilmingmore Community Center for the Arts®.”

“Why are you pronouncing the… anyway, look Steven, you can’t just take a girl to _one_ place when you’re out and about doing your thing.”

“But she only wanted to go out to the Wilmingmore Com-”

“All right, we get it, but the point is Ste-man, every girl says she only wants to go out to one place, but it’s implied she wants to go to other places and such.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, sure, it’s like when you say you’re going out to get donuts. Obviously you can’t get donuts without getting some fry bits too, right?”

“I guess so.” Amethyst made an affirmative nod, taking a packet of mustard and squeezing it till it blasted into her mouth and all across her face. Nothing a stretched out tongue couldn’t fix in a jiffy.

“So, where you gonna take her?”  Steven pondered this, still no more familiar with Wilmingmore than he was the first time she asked him.

“Well... I guess I could check on my phone for a donut store-”

“Not donuts, man!” Amethyst gave him a playful nudge. “You’ll be all alone in the big city. You should check out the night scene, cruise by the bay, do all that montage stuff.”

“You think so?”

“I know so,” Amethyst puffed her chest, never more sure of anything. “You two haven’t seen each other in a while, so you gotta make it special, right?”

“Right!”

“Right!” She slapped Steven’s back and the two of them nodded in unison.

“But, I still don’t know where we should go first.” He said.

“I dunno, you spy anything cool while you were passing through that one time?”

 

Steven had only seen the billboard advertising the arcade by chance, playing a one-sided game of “Eye-Spy” with Garnet as his dad was too busy driving and she was too busy steaming. Off the 305 exiting town towards Empire City was Willy Wilmingmore’s Arcade and Pizzeria, est. 1987. Connie couldn’t help but be perturbed over the glowing neon eyes and massive buckteeth of its weasel mascot, the arcade’s namesake, but Steven paid it no mind. Had she not known him for as long as she did she might be tempted to say nothing bothered him, but that was never true of anyone. Steven’s problem was that he kept all his problems bottled up until they overflowed in him. A pop bottle that had been shaken too much, ready to burst at the slightest twist of the cap. She’d learned this before when he had tried to shut her out of his life after the first incident with Jasper, and more recently during one of their training sessions.

She hoped he’d learned to move past that, for his sake, yet there was something distant about him this evening. Not blatantly so, but she could tell his mind was in some other place, somewhere he didn’t like to be.

Steven said nothing about it, of course he wouldn’t, as he gave Lion another handful of biscuits with the instructions to stay close by then led the way into the arcade, underneath the shadow of Willy Wilmingmore’s ever-glaring eyes and nasty, big, pointy teeth.

“Welcome to Willy Wilmingmore’s,” An overtly enthusiastic teenager, Josie by name, Steven noted, wearing a brown polo shirt underneath a dirty pair of overalls greeted them at the front door, “Willy was hoping you’d turn up!”

“Guess Willy has future vision too, huh?” Steven joked, more so to Connie than the employee, who wore her smile as though it were a Glasgow grin.

“Will you be interested in the regular tickets or the deluxe for your visit tonight?” She asked.

“What’s the difference between the two?” Connie asked.

“With the deluxe package you get all the games and play place in the arcade, plus full access to the showroom and a front row to seat to Willy Wilmingmore and Friends performances.” She pointed some ways behind her, where a group of much younger kids were gathered around the large animatronic of Willy, his friends Billy Beaver and Marty the Marsupial to his left and right respectively. They were singing some random song about doing what your parents told you, being too smart for strangers, and other life lessons they could get for free on TV, but what Connie was most taken by was how the robots moved. Every jerky arm motion, every audible gear of the mechanics cranking away inside, and the way they would twitch every so often so that their audio became garbled and their eyes sputtered electricity.

“I think I’ll have to decline, thank you.” Steven had to mask his minor disappointment but wasn’t about to force Connie to do anything she didn’t want to. Especially not tonight.

“Just the regular then, please.” He said to the employee with his own, much more genuine, smile.

“Fifteen dollars.” Steven reached into his pocket and pulled only one fifty dollar bill this time, Connie was surprised he even had some left for how generously he tipped the valet back at the community center. He gave it to Josie whose eyes bulged when she saw the amount. She probably should’ve expected these two would be loaded when they showed up to a hodunk arcade dressed like they were going to see a nickelodeon in the last century.

“Uh,” she composed herself with a cough, “I’m afraid we don’t break bills higher than a twenty, sir.”

“Oh,” Steven took it back from her then fiddled in his pockets for something smaller in a fruitless effort. “I guess my dad only gave me fifties.” He scratched his head as he gave Josie a sheepish laugh. Connie retrieved her wallet from her handbag.

“I’ll get this Steven, don’t worry about it.” She counted a ten and five singles and gave them to the employee, still glaring at Steven from the corner of her eyes, wondering what a luxury it must be to have parents hand out fifty dollar bills as though they were simple lunch money. Heck, by the looks of it to this kid it was probably nothing more than a “small loan.”

Josie printed out two tickets and gave them to Steven and Connie, stamping their wrists as she let them through.

“Sorry about that,” Steven said to her as he was nearly knocked over by a group of younger kids running for the prize booth.

“It’s fine,” Connie assured him, “Dad gave me a twenty for bus fare before he left.” She took out her remaining dollar bills and fed them to the nearby token machine, ten bronze coins falling into a tiny plastic cup after a disconcerting tremor and a bit of smoke emitted from the machine. “So,” she took the cup and gave it a little shake, “what do you want to do first?”

Steven opened his mouth to answer but shut it after he took his first full view of the arcade. It was leagues bigger than the Funland equivalent back home, with plenty more games and interactive simulators to accommodate for it. Combined with the rushing employees wiping down tables and even quicker children rushing to and fro, he could simultaneously feel the enormity and the claustrophobia tie another knot directly under the previous one (and he was beginning to run out of room for them).

“Uh…” He knew he was taking too long, Connie was watching him, waiting for him to make a decision. His eyes flashed all about him until they settled on one. “That one!” He shouted, a bit too loud for someone three feet to his side. Connie followed his finger to a larger machine where a muscular, brute of man with golden eyes was facing off against an even buffer giant in a military uniform with red eyes on the display poster above it.

“Okay!” He adjusted his collar again as she went to the game, wondering why his undershirt felt so wet.

Connie put in two tokens as the game announcer shouted the title for the entire arcade to hear.

“ **AVENUE BRAWLER!!!** ” Connie almost dropped the second coin as Steven hopped back a foot, both waiting a moment to in case the game yelled at them again.

“What’s this game about anyway?” She asked.

“Avenue Brawl-”

“ **AVENUE BRAWLER!!!** ” They paused another moment.

“Avenue Brawler?” She nodded and Steven gave a shrug in response. “I just though it looked cool.”

“I heard about this one game where you could tear out an opponent’s spinal cord through their stomach and use it to smash them up into oblivion, is that this one?”

“Oh, no, that’s Fatal Pugilism.” Steven said.

“ **AVENUE BRAWLER!!!** ”

“All right, all right!” Connie slammed one of the buttons hoping to shut the announcer up.

“ **CHOOSE YOUR CHARACTER!!!** ” There was a surprisingly large amount of fighters on the roster, all with a unique if not unrealistic design. Steven eventually settled on the golden-eyed character from the display, named Golden-Eyes, who fought with his fists while Connie picked a woman wearing a blue kimono with buns in her hair who fought with a parasol, named Kimono Girl.

“ **READY?! FIGHT!!!** ” The two characters were pitted against one another on a floating platform with dozens of waterfalls in the background. Very serene for what was going to the be the stage of a brutal fight, if either of them could figure out how the game worked.

“So, how do you punch?” Connie asked, fiddling with a few of the buttons.

“Oh, hey, you just jumped.”

“What?”

“Look, you jumped.” Steven pointed at her character jumping on screen. “That’s… A.” He pressed the A button to his side and watched his character jump as well. Connie followed suit, the two of them taking about ten seconds to jump around the battlefield and hop into one another.

“Oh watch,” Connie said, patting his shoulder, “I can charge it.” She held the A button down, the two watching as Kimono Girl crouched and a purple aura consumed her, then she leapt higher than either of them had jumped before, till half of her body was off screen.

“Woooooooooah!!!” Steven’s eyes widened as he held down the jump button himself, releasing it and watching his character fly. “This is so aweso-hey, what was that?!”

“What?” Golden-eyes fell back to the platform after Kimono Girl got him with an aerial kick.

“You kicked me!” Steven said in his usual, undeterred jovial manner.

“No I didn’t.” Connie directed her eyes to the ceiling, trying to fight back a coy smile and failing spectacularly.

“Yes you did, I saw you!”

“I’m still trying to figure out all the buttons, it’s not my fault if I-HEY!” Kimono Girl was blasted to the edge of the screen by a blue fireball shot out of the palms of Golden-Eye. “You cheater!” She bumped his thigh with hers and their match began in earnest.

“How is it cheating,” Steven asked as he began to jam all the buttons on his side, “you’re supposed to fight each other!”

“It was armistice!” Connie shouted defiantly.

“I don’t even know what that is!” Steven spammed the fireball button as Connie defended herself with the block button, Kimono Girl using her parasol to inspired effect. The match came to a draw when the timer ran out, both of them laughing too hard to even notice it at first.

“Oh, guess we both lost.” Steven said between snorts.

“Okay,” Connie steadied her breathing and loosened her shoulders, something she did before ever training session they had, so he knew she meant business. “Okay, Steven. We should probably figure out how this game actually works so why don’t we take twenty-five seconds to actually-wait NO!!!” No sooner had the announcer told them to fight did Steven begin to spam the fireballs again, Connie having to scramble to go on the defensive.

By pure luck, and by pressing the D button at the exact nanosecond, she was able to deflect the fireball back at Golden-Eye with the parasol, both of them stunned into silence by the act. Steven’s gaze met Connie and the girl chuckled wickedly.

“Try to get me now, Steven! TRY TO GET ME NOW!!!” Kimono Girl began to chase Golden-Eyes around the arena, not able to get very far once Connie learned that she could use the parasol as a projectile. With thirty seconds to spare she won the round, pumping both her fists in the air in celebration.

“Uh, remember what you said about taking some time to learn the controls?” Connie stared at him.

“ **READY?!** ” Connie smirked, Steven gulped.

“Oh yeah.” No sooner had the announcer told them to fight was Connie spamming the projectile button, leaving poor Steven only a split second to react.

“ARMISTICE!!!” He shouted, leading both of them in a new fit of laughter. After twenty seconds Kimono Girl, in a feat that surprised both of them, grabbed Golden-Eyes and threw him up into the air, checking her watch before closing her parasol, jumping into the air herself and striking Golden-Eyes so hard he was flung off screen till he was naught but a glimmer in the horizon.

“ **KIMONO GIRL WINS!!!** ” Connie grinned at him as he feigned anger. Of course he couldn’t feign it for very long.

“Okay, I’ll admit,” he admitted, “that was pretty cool.”

He let her choose the game this time, spending two more tokens on a game that saw a custodian save a politician from a giant orangutan. They took turns going at the game as Steven made small talk.

“So, how’s school been going for you?” Connie was playing rather intensely, having made it further into the third level than either of them so far on her penultimate life, but she was always an effective multitasker.

“Pretty good so far.” She groaned in frustration when a careless jump saw her plummet from a platform to an instant death. She backed away and let Steven have a go on his last life. “I’m taking a lot of AP classes, Math, English, Science, all the core stuff, so that’s got me pretty busy.” Steven looked at her from the corner of his eye, the knots in his stomach not liking the sound of her being busier than before. “Jeff ended up transferring to my science class recently too, completely at random.”

“That’s neat.” Steven said, becoming too cocky in the game as he made a go at the mop power up, only to be taken by surprise by one of the falling boxes, costing him the last of his lives.

“I think you’d like Jeff a lot,” Connie said as she took the reins one last time, “he likes a lot of those old Samurai movies you do.”

“I like him already.” Steven grinned, playing back seat driver as Connie neared the top of the platform in level one. “Oh, careful, he’s gonna throw a box!” The orangutan did just that, but Connie’s reflexes were too sharp to be thwarted by a pixelated ape.

“So,” Steven wondered whether or not he should finish his thought, taking a plunge as Connie literally mopped the floor with the flames chasing her in game. “So, what do you think your availability will be for training?”

“Hard to say,” Connie answered without tearing her eyes away from the screen. “The homework isn’t too hard so I can probably finish it all before the weekend.”

“The weekend is good.” Steven said aloud, cringing when Connie almost got hit by another of the orangutan’s boxes.

“But,” she added, “that doesn’t take later on in the year into account.” Steven glanced at her from the corner of his eye again.

“What happens later on in the year?” One move too slow meant a cardboard box to the custodian’s head, and the orangutan’s taunting chortles signifying their game was over.

“Tests,” she said, releasing her grip on the joystick, “lots and lots of tests.”

They took a break from the games to grab a pizza and sat at one of the tables as far away from the showroom as Connie could manage. They ate in silence, the girl becoming just as distant as she had been when they first met, something Steven was quick to realize. He slurped away at his drink, berating himself for whatever it was he had done to put her in this mood.

“Hey,” he said, breaking through the ambience of Willy Wilmingmore’s encore in the next room, “sorry if I made you mad about anything.”

“No,” she shook her head in a fervent motion. “No, no, no, I’m not mad. I can’t think of any time I was mad at you, to be honest.” As much as hearing that throwaway comment made his heart sing like a canary in the Spring, Steven knew his friend well enough to know when something was up.

“You’ve been pretty quiet the past couple minutes,” he said as if he were Dr. Maheswaran, “you’ve barely touched your pizza either.” He pointed at the slice on her plate, still hot and dripping in a mystery sauce that had managed to evade three health inspectors in the past year.

“Being honest again, Steven,” Connie prodded at the slice with her spork, “this pizza is looks pretty gross.” Steven stopped chewing, rolling the bits of cheese and sauce in his mouth so that his taste buds could truly process them.

“Huh… it is pretty gross.” He washed it down with some soda, smiling when he saw Connie shake her head again, this time with a grin.

“You’re crazy.”

They sat in silence once more, or as much silence as a building full of young children could provide. All of a sudden a bell rang and the monotonous voice of an employee nearing the end of a long shift came out through the large speakers hanging from the ceiling.

“Willy Wilmingmore’s is closing in ten minutes. We hope you had a fantastic day learning and singing with Willy and friends, please come again soon… whatever.” He signed off with a click, and what children were left in the showroom began to scramble all about the arcade to get their favorites in one more time. Steven was much more suave. He stood up, brushing whatever crumbs and bits of cheese were left on his clothes and offered his hand to Connie.

“Come on, let’s do one more game.” She accepted his hand and rose to her feet, as elegantly as she had at the opera.

“What did you have in mind?”

 

Prance Prance Insurrection. A game featuring thirty (plus one) of the greatest hit singles, contemporary or classic.

“Why don’t they just say thirty-one then?” Connie asked, taking off her shoes and placing them by the right dance pad where she also hung her handbag.

“Dunno,” Steven took off his own shoes placing them by Connie’s. His voice became solemn, “No one ever pays attention to thirty-one. Overshadowed by its younger sister.”

Connie placed a ridiculous amount of four tokens into the machine, the key reason why none of the other kids had bothered with it, and the two of them took their position on the dance pads.

“We probably don’t have much time to waste looking for a good song.” Connie said, noting the nearby clock.

“Let’s go rando!” Steven said, waiting for Connie’s nod of approval before stepping down on the enter button at the top right on his dance pad. For being a game comprised of all the “contemporary or classic” hits, the song they happened upon was the opening to an obscure anime (the plus one, as advertised). A little kitten-puppy hybrid popped up on the screen, licking it and leaving a bit of slobber before it jumped off and led the camera to its house.

“Have you ever seen this show before?” Connie asked Steven, who was more well versed in areas such as this.

“I’ve never seen this before in my life.” Steven watched as the kitten-puppy frolicked through a field of flowers, chasing a butterfly and rolling through a grove of dandelions.

“What is this?” Connie looked back at the clock, only five minutes left before closing, and Josie was giving them the evil eye from the entrance.

“I don’t know but-WOOOOOOOOOAH!!!”

Steven’s ‘woah’ was not unwarranted, as a cannon ball blasted the grove and the shadow of a giant airship loomed over the land, the kitten-puppy staring in abject horror. From the deck of the airship an unkempt man dressed as a pirate, with peg leg and eye patch and the like, to taunt the shaken hybrid. Suddenly the music swelled, the kitten-puppy stood on its hind legs, and from the very depths of the Earth it summoned a mighty katana, leaping into the air higher than any Avenue Brawler character and soaring like a rocket to the airship. Steven and Connie were so entranced by the spectacle that they nearly missed the arrows coming on screen.

“Oh, shoot!” Connie stepped furiously, trying to divert her attention away from what was going on with the kitten-puppy, but was too invested in the plot to focus on the actual dance. She looked at Steven who fared no better than her, flubbing even the easier steps as they watched an army of robots charge the kitten-puppy, slashing away at all of them as though they were made of butter.

“Steven!” Connie shouted, sweat pouring from her brow as the arrows sped up to match the building music. “We’re slipping up!”

“I can’t help it,” Steven shouted back, “I wanna see what happens next!”

“We can look it up later,” Connie grabbed his hand and gave it a firm squeeze. “If we lose now we’ll just be failing that weird puppy-cat thing!” Steven looked at her and then back at the screen where the kitten-puppy had reached a faceoff with the grizzled sky pirate. His stare could shatter the screen if that were one of his powers. Then the two became serious.

A crowd started to gather as the young partners laid waste to the PPI machine. Jumping like mad men, tangling their feet in ways that seemed impossible, stomping on arrow buttons on their adjacent dance pads.

As the music neared its crescendo and the arrows became so fast you couldn’t see what was happening on screen any longer, a familiar feeling overcame Steven. He ignored every other sound or sense around him; the crowd, the smell of the arcade, even the music from the machine was lost to him as his focus was put on one thing and one thing alone. He was staring at it as she felt the same, and then the gemstone on the boy’s stomach began to glow.

In a flash of pink and flourish, and just as the song had ended, the boy and girl were gone. Replaced by a slender figure that towered over everyone in the arcade, even the adults. As their consciousness returned to them, they finally noticed the crowd, staring at them in a mix of awe and confusion.

“Guess we tore it up a little too much.” They said, shocked at the familiar yet foreign voice.

“Wait,” they looked at their hands, then at how high up they were from the ground. “Did we?” They made a dash for the nearest bathroom, almost slipping on the wet tile as they ran to one of the mirrors, confirming the obvious of what had just happened.

“It’s me.” Stevonnie laughed before adding, “It’s us!” They hadn’t accidentally fused like that for a very long time. Part of the reason they’d started taking up training as Stevonnie was to better control their fusion, but it was like Garnet said early on, when two people such as Connie and Steven shared as close a bond as they did, accidental fusions were bound to happen regardless of how much training they had.

Gazing at themselves in the mirror Stevonnie saw the mixture of both her component’s fancy attires blended into one. While most of their top retained Steven’s tux, save for the lace collar around their neck and blue sleeves underneath the elongated suit, the bottom half, divided by a dark blue cummerbund, was Connie’s bright blue dress. Inspected from bottom upwards, their outfit grew from bright blue to dark black. An unusual mix, yet they seemed to pull it off.

Stevonnie twirled so they could see their whole appearance. Their feet were bare on the cold, wet tile but shoes were always a hassle for them anyway.

“Still,” they said aloud, “probably should go pick them up.” They had to duck a little to get back out of the bathroom, and were surprised to find the crowd had migrated from the PPI machine and into a small circle on the other side of the door. They stared at Stevonnie, many taken aback by their beauty and many more noticeably uncomfortable from that fact. They had been two children before after all, who couldn’t have been older than their early teens at most.

Stevonnie gave them an anxious chuckle, as if to try and reassure them they were fine, but fusion was not so easy a concept to introduce to ordinary humans. Besides, the arcade was past closing, there was no time to go into all that now.

“Excuse me, I just need my…” They scooted through the crowd, back to the machine where their shoes and handbag were waiting for them. Stuffing both pairs as best as they could into the tiny thing, they shuffled out of the arcade, passing by Josie on their way out. “Good night.” They waved, thinking nothing of her expression, mouth agape and eyes bulging out of their sockets as they had before. It was only during the next day at work did she realize that this peculiar person (persons?) had given her what she always wanted. You could hear a pin drop from the other side of the building.

 

Stevonnie shook as they stepped onto the cold asphalt of the parking lot. Their coat doing enough to keep at least ninety percent of their body warm.

“Maybe we should’ve worn shoes after all.” She said to herself.

“We can stop if you want.”

“No, it’s fine. I think… I think I want to run.”

“Where?”

“Anywhere.”

They took a deep breath of Autumn air, cracking their neck and stretching out their limbs before they decided on a random direction and took off. Running as fast as their legs could carry them. Away from the arcade and into the city night that still had so much to offer them. So much that it was enough to make them forget that their ride had long since vacated the area of his own accord.

 

The Valet collapsed on the front door as he shut it, kicking off his shoes and groaning at the aches in his feet.

“Hi honey, I made you dinner!” There was the culprit behind his pain, calling to him from the other room.

It was his husband who had first suggested he would be good at a valet position at the local community center not three blocks away from their meager little home. ‘Good exercise’, he said, ‘A chance to immerse yourself in culture’, he said. He’d like to see him try to run back and forth between cars for rich jerks who couldn’t be bothered to at least look him in the eye as they tossed their keys at his forgettable face.

But of course, every time he sauntered into the living room and saw that big oaf in his footsie pajamas, giving him a peck on the cheek and taking his chicken soup, still hot, from the coffee table in front of his favorite armchair, he knew he would never truly wish that on him. He was too innocent for that kind of soul crushing on a daily basis.

“How was your day?” His husband asked in the middle of eating his own bowl of soup, eyes glued to the TV screen. And that was the million-dollar question of the evening (or at least a few fifty dollar bills’ worth).

“Very… odd.” Was all the off duty Valet could answer. His husband cocked an eyebrow as one eye forced itself away from the TV.

“Odd as in the usual odd or very odd?”  The Valet opened his mouth to give some clarification but found he couldn’t. Not quite so easily into those two categories of odd at least.

“I’m not sure how to describe it exactly.”

“Try me.”

Before he could take him up on that challenge the doorbell rang.

“Not it!” His husband declared, raising his index finger to his nose so fast he almost knocked his bowl of soup to the floor.

The Valet frowned at him and strained to get back out of his chair as though he had aged a hundred years in a millisecond. His knees cracking and his back burning with a terrible intensity as he hobbled back to the front door. At ten o’clock in the evening he couldn’t begin to imagine who it was, but whoever they were they had some fixation with the doorbell. Every fraction of a millisecond after one bell would ring, another would take its place, then another and another until it was a choir of doorbells ringing death tolls in his ears. He would be deaf soon if this carried on, but at least he wouldn’t be able to hear any more of it.

Aggravation blocking out self-preservation, the Valet opened the door and was prepared to give the bell ringer a piece of his mind.

“WILL YOU KINDLY-eh…” For the second time tonight he was at a loss for words. The doorbell still rang ad nausea, but he found himself quite incapable of taking any action about it. After all, if you saw a giant, pink lion ringing your doorbell would you stop him?

“Who is that honey?!” His husband called from within the house, growing impatient with the noise himself. The Valet remained motionless, meeting the unreadable stare of the lion that seemed to mean no harm but provided as much security in its docility as a regular colored lion in the wild. He smacked his lips and stretched himself out on the front porch, seemingly eager to be invited in.

“Well, who is it?!” His husband called out again. The Valet looked back into the house and then at the lion. Unable to say anything in response except for one, simple sentence.

“I think I can tell you how odd my day was now.”

 

Stevonnie ran so fast they could hardly tell where it was they were running. They ran past the community center, to the bowery, to the downtown district, leaving a gust of air so strong in their wake everywhere they went that it might have been the north wind itself giving chase. It would never catch them, nothing could slow them down as they were now. They leaped over cars, pedestrians wandering the night streets, at one point they even leaped over one of the taller buildings in the financial district.

Building up enough speed as they stared at it, focusing all attention on the sixty-foot monolith. Finally, after bending their knees just before it looked like they were going to collide with the building, they released, going as high as they had ever gone before. Up and up they went, Stevonnie controlling their gravity as they did. They gasped at the sight of the city below, and of the surrounding bay and countryside. Their landing was smooth and did not break their running stride in the slightest. They went on, going in the direction where they had seen the bay.

Stevonnie ran all across the bay, from one end to another, and then from that end back, not knowing where or why they were running but loving every minute of it. Loving how the moon’s reflection glimmered on the water below, or how the lights of the city looked like fireflies on the surface as well. Their legs felt no ache or fatigue, not even the chill of the cold ground on their feet could slow them down. It was as if they had fused for the first time all over again, and they couldn’t get enough of it.

Eventually Stevonnie could no longer be sated to run around the city of Wilmingmore alone, so they left. Ran down the highway leading towards Beach City, keeping off the road as they did, though there were very few people headed this way at this time of night. Eyeing an unbeaten path up the hill to their right they broke away from the road and dashed to see where it would take them.

Steadily they climbed, onward and upward, bounding along the hill until they reached the fruit of their labor, the summit. They could see the entire city of Wilmingmore from on high, all the cars still going about the neon streets, and from this point of view the moon’s reflection seemed to engulf the entire bay. It was gorgeous, and it was enough to end Stevonnie’s hour long run.

Fatigue and pain finally caught up to them as they fell to the ground, laying out their arms and legs in the grass and trying to count what few stars were visible in the glare of the city lights.

“I needed that.” They said, laughing and panting heavily. After a moment there was another flash, a strange discomfort, and one became two once more.

“That’s…” Steven panted, “the longest I’ve ever run.”

“Me too…” Connie was out of breath as well, both of them back in their regular bodies and clothes, feet still bare and sweat claiming every inch of them.

“Oh, darn!” Connie stood up quickly, brushing off her dress as she did. “Grass stains are such a hassle to get out of anything.” Steven knew his tux was probably stained as well, but he was still too tired to do anything but lay there and breathe. In and out, in and out, feeling his heart pounding away inside of him, and the breath from his lungs creating a small cloud in the late Autumn air.

“Did you want to keep going?” Steven asked her, but Connie shook her head.

“I think I’d,” she carefully sat near the edge of the hill, “just like to sit here for a minute.” Gathering as much strength as he could Steven propped himself off the ground and crawled to Connie’s side, hanging his feet over the edge of the hill and resting his arms behind him. They were as quiet as they had been back at the arcade, but it was not without reason this time. Still, Steven couldn’t help but think back to what Connie had said before she grew as quiet as her old self.

“Hey, Connie,” she looked at him, “what you said before, about all those tests you’ll have to take… is that what was bothering you?” She nodded, looking back in the direction of the city below them. “Well,” finding the right words was a worse struggle than anything they’d done as Stevonnie, “you don’t have to worry about tests. You’re the smartest person I know; You’ll ace all of them.”

“It’s not just that,” she said, thanking him for the compliment anyway, “it’s the fact that from here till I end school all my worth in what I want to do is going to be defined by tests and papers and all these other things that…” Her voice trailed off.

“That what?” Steven wore an empathetic frown on his face. Connie looked at him and felt whatever guard she had built up falling to its knees.

“I guess I just took it for granted that everything’s going to change from now on.” She said. “Nothing will ever be as easy as it was. Before I know it I’ll be in my twenties and going for some degree in something for college, not that I even know what I want to do now and when I blink again I’ll be old and dying and…” Tears started to fall from Connie’s face. Steven felt a few of his own as he reflected on a common fear they both had.

The future. Never had there been two words that could inspire such hope and such dread all at once. For two usually optimistic souls such as them it held limitless opportunities. Connie could grow up to follow in her mother’s footsteps, or use her compassion and vast knowledge as a politician, a police officer, a teacher, anything she could set her mind to. Steven himself may grow to be a much more competent member of the Crystal Gems than he could ever hope to be now. He could find the strength to help the others, from the original trio to the two renegades living in his family barn, and guide them the way his mother might have wanted him to, or might have wanted to herself. But just as the future held multitudinous opportunity for success, so it did for the inverse as well. Steven could feel that inverse looming over his head every day, and wondered how long it had been hanging over Connie’s as well.

“You still haven’t been honest with me.” She said suddenly.

“About what?” Steven said, shocked that she would think he could ever hide something from her.

“You haven’t been yourself all night,” and this was why Connie had one of the greatest minds he had ever known. “You’ve been enough like yourself but something’s been bothering you too.” Steven blushed as he turned away from her, not knowing how she would react to his selfish desire to spend more time with her. Especially after everything she had just said.

“Come on, Steven,” She took his hand, drawing his eyes back to her, “what’s upsetting you?”

 

“I can’t stop thinking about her.” Steven said.

“Don’t you always think about her?” Garnet asked as she pressed his tuxedo, the two of them standing on one of the hands of the Temple where the rest of Steven’s laundry hanged.

“Well, yeah, but it feels different this time. It’s like every time I think about seeing her tonight my stomach gets all cramped and my gem feels like it burns.” Garnet paused in her ironing and looked down at the boy who was not quite so little as she remembered, but not quite a full grown man or even Gem either.

“Separation anxiety.” She said to herself, earning a confused look from the quartz. She stopped what she was doing entirely and knelt so she was at his level.

“Do you remember when Ruby and Sapphire separated so we could distract the Homeworld Rubies?” Steven nodded. “You remember how they could hardly keep away from one another?” Of course he wouldn’t forget that, it nearly put them in a fight, even if he couldn’t blame the two for their feelings in hindsight. “Fusion is a miraculous thing, Steven. When done between Gems, or people,” she bobbed his nose with her finger, “with a strong connection, even when that fusion is separate the connection is never severed. That fusion becomes a part of both or all the participants as though it were a phantom limb or sixth sense.”

“I think I get that already.” Steven said, noting how his relationships between Connie and Amethyst had only gotten stronger after they both had fused with him.

“When that relationship is exceptionally strong, however, when separated from the other half of the fusion for a prolonged period of time, one or both components may feel unease or anxiety, a strong desire to see the fusion connected once more.”

“Is that a bad thing?” Steven asked.

“Not entirely. Ruby and Sapphire have been fused together for so long, to be separate for even a few minutes is foreign to them. However, in the case of something like Jasper and Lapis, where the two were mutually unbeneficial for one another, they craved to be fused into Malachite again, even when they both knew such a relationship would only cause them pain.”

“And back when Pearl kept destroying the Communication Hub so you two could be Sardonyx,” Steven said, hating to trudge up bad memories like that but needing the clarification, “that was another part of separation anxiety?” Garnet nodded, her face as stoic as ever but clearly not wanting to relive that experience either.

“I’ve been under its influence as well,” she admitted, possibly to alleviate any lingering hurt towards that whole fiasco. “When Amethyst and I became Sugilite to destroy the Hub the first time. Both of our reckless traits fluctuated when we were left alone, becoming lost in the power and the connection that neither wanted to separate, until she became just as unhinged as Malachite.” Steven would never equate Sugilite, or anything to do with Amethyst and Garnet, with Malachite, but Garnet left him no time to tell her that.

“The point is, Steven, all Gems who have fused with one or multiple partners feel some form of separation anxiety for one another. Some can ignore it as though it were no more bothersome than an itch, and others crave it to the point of complete self-destruction.” He gulped.

“So… which one am I?” She looked at him through her shades, taking them off and revealing her three, as she gave him a warm smile.

“You’re just a kind child who misses his friend,” she put her hand on his shoulder and tussled his hair as she stood, “that is all.” She placed her glasses back over her eyes as she went back to Steven’s tux, with little under an hour left before he had to leave for Wilmingmore. “If you’re worried about what Connie might say about your feelings, you should be honest and tell her about them.” Steven felt the first twist of the knot that would remain with him for the rest of the night.

“Can’t you just lend me your future vision so I can see what she might say?”

“Not every problem can be solved with future vision, Steven.” That was true enough, he supposed. Neither of them would even be here if Ruby had so blindly relied on it as an absolute. “Tell her,” she said again, “yours is a connection that has made one of the most unique and beautiful fusions I have ever seen. It may just surprise you what she has to say.”

Steven considered this, considered telling Connie how he felt and how anxious he became knowing that they would be spending less and less time together as the school months went by. He thought about telling her at the community center, sometime during the intermission and they went to get some fresh air on the balcony. He thought about telling her in the arcade, while he was eating the disgusting pizza and she remained so quiet. He thought maybe she had read his thoughts already while they were fused, but neither one could get a read on the other as Stevonnie kept themselves busy running. That’s all he seemed to be doing tonight, running away from what needed to be said. As his mind returned to the present he would consider Garnet’s words, and the knowledge she gave on the connection of fusions. Staring at Connie who waited patiently for a response. A response that would have to wait to be told in full.

 

“I’m just worried about the future too.” He answered finally. Connie could tell this was only a half truth, but it was a truth nonetheless. Steven would tell her or someone else about his problems in due time, she just hoped it was long before he had another breakdown.

Edging closer to her friend and resting her head on his shoulder, she looked up at the night sky, sighing with content as she did.

“At least I know one thing about the future.” Steven’s face grew so red he thought it might burst.

“Wh-what?” He asked, trying to mask how quickly his heart was thumping.

“We’ll always be together.” Steven’s heartrate lessened as he gave a content sigh himself, watching the busy little city below them carry on its nightly dance, blissfully unaware to the two strangers watching over it, lost in their own world and for the first time in the whole evening, preoccupied only in the now.

Connie’s phone vibrated from within her handbag. She took it out, handing Steven his shoes as she did, and saw the alert on her phone. Half past eleven, her parents would be expecting her soon.

“Guess we’d better go.” She said rising to her feet and helping Steven to his own. “It’s too late try and catch a bus, and too far to walk home.” Steven might have offered that they fuse again, but was still cautious about Garnet’s words and thought better of it. Stevonnie had been given enough of a work out that night as it was, anyway.

“I wonder where Lion went,” Steven said, “I always tell him to stay put but he just goes wherever he wants-oh there he is.” Lion came bounding up the hill, coming to rest just in front of the two children. “Hey Leon, where’ve you been?” Lion roared sleepily in response. “Yeah, guess you want to get home too.” He hopped up on Lion’s back, smelling something strange as he did. “Bath salts?” He asked, bringing his nose closer to Lion’s mane. His fur felt groomed as well, smoother than it had felt in a long time. What had he been doing since he ditched them back at the arcade?

He shrugged it off for another day, helping Connie up and patting Lion above his left ear.

“Take us home, boy.” Lion roared a pink portal right over the edge of the hill. Charging forwards and leaping from the top of the summit directly into it. They landed in front of the Maheswaran residence, a terraced house linked with others just like it, yet unmistakable to Steven for who lived in it.

She hopped off of Lion and Steven followed her to her door. They stopped as Connie took out her house key from her handbag and put it in the doorknob.

“Thanks for coming with me, Steven,” she said, “I had a great time.”

“Me too.” Steven said with a signature smile, hiding a shred of doubt that this may be the last time he would see her in person for some time. Just as Connie turned the key and opened the door a crack, she hesitated. Steven furrowed his brow and was about to ask what was wrong when she flung her arms around him. Shocked, elated, and wishing they could stay like this forever, he returned the hug.

“Ahem.” They broke the hug when Dr. Maheswaran appeared at the front door, her arms crossed and her expression so stoic she could give Garnet lessons. Connie coughed as Steven rubbed his arm, stepping through the door past her mother and into her house, looking back at Steven and wishing him a goodnight before heading out of the living room and up the stairs.

“Good night!” Steven called after her, leaving him alone with her mother for a few more awkward moments. “Uh, good evening Dr. Maheswaran.” He smiled nervously. She stared down at him, arms still crossed and face still stoic.

“Good evening, Steven.” She said finally, stepping back into her house and lingering at the doorstep a few moments more. “Thank you for returning her home safely.” Steven said it was no trouble at all and turned around to get back on Lion and head for his own home. “She’s very fond of you, you know.” Her voice stopped him dead in his tracks, turning his head around to meet her stoic look. “Don’t disappoint her.” Was all she said before shutting the door and locking it for the night.

Steven’s eye was still fixed on the door, and then at the window where Connie’s bedroom was. With a heavy sigh he returned to Lion’s back, whispering in his ear to take the long way home to give him some time to think.

He reflected on everything that had happened that night, and all the things Garnet had told him, as well as the other anxious thoughts that protruded his mind on a regular basis. Most of all he thought about Connie’s words on the hill, that no matter what hardship, past, present, or future, would come their way, they would face them, big and small, together. It was this thought alone that kept a small, tired smile on his face the rest of the way to the Temple. The knots in his stomach nowhere to be felt.


End file.
